Greater New Orleans

NOPD on Monday (Jan. 13) confirmed detectives have opened a homicide investigation into Larry Bernard, who goes by the name Armani Nicole Davenport, a performer in drag queen shows, who is accused of giving illegal silicone injections. A transgender person who authorities say received the injections has died. (Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office)
(Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office)

After the New Year's Day death of Brenisha Hall, 25, who had been in a coma for two
months, police and prosecutors are reviewing whether there is a negligent homicide case.

Police in November arrested Larry Bernard, a transgender woman and frequent performer in beauty pageants who goes by the name Armani Nicole Davenport, on a lesser charge of negligent injuring.

"In light of the victim's death, we are re-evaluating the case at this
time to see if additional charges are warranted under the law," said
Christopher Bowman, a spokesman for Orleans Parish District Attorney
Leon Cannizzaro.

New Orleans Police Department homicide detectives got the case on Monday and were in the
"preliminary stages" of an investigation into a possible case of negligent homicide, said Officer
Frank Robertson III, an NOPD spokesman.

Unlike most homicide cases, there was no autopsy by a coroner's office, and Hall's death was ruled by doctors to be a result of natural causes. But that alone wouldn't foreclose a negligent homicide charge if the evidence warrants a case, authorities said.

Hospital officials performed an autopsy Hall and notified the Jefferson Parish coroner's office by telephone of the death, said Coroner Gerry Cvitanovich. Hall, who had received treatment at Interim LSU Public Hospital, was a resident of Jefferson Parish.

After consulting with the hospital over the phone, the coroner's office agreed the death was from natural causes and released the body to the family without examining it, which Cvitanovich said is standard practice for hospital deaths believed not to be the result of a suicide, homicide or accident.

Hall was buried Saturday (Jan. 11). Since the Orleans Parish coroner's office wasn't notified of the death, the office, which would have jurisdiction over the case, was unable to examine the body to make its own death ruling, said chief investigator John Gagliano.

Cvitanovich, the Jefferson Parish coroner, said in light of the additional information about the silicone injections, Orleans Parish authorities are "giving it a good second look, which is appropriate."

Bernard, a beauty pageant queen from Dallas who had lived in Baton Rouge, is accused of injecting two people in the hips and buttocks with silicone on Oct. 24 in a house in the 1200 block of South Salcedo Street, according to an NOPD police report. Hall later complained of respiratory distress and was taken to the hospital, where she was comatose.

Bernard surrendered to authorities in November after NOPD announced Bernard was wanted. Bernard was booked on a count of negligent injuring, a misdemeanor.

It was not immediately clear if Bernard had an attorney and efforts to reach her were unsuccessful.

One legal observer said if a homicide case is brought, the defense could have an advantage because of the natural-death ruling.

Criminal defense attorney Harry Rosenberg, a former prosecutor who is not involved with the investigation, said that even if a doctor testified that the injections played a role in Hall's death, the coroner's initial classification of natural causes would "heighten" the district attorney's burden of proof, making it "considerably more difficult for the DA's office to establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt."

He said prosecutors could possibly help their case if Hall's family would allow authorities to exhume the body so the Orleans Parish coroner's office could conduct another autopsy knowing all the background information. They would then have to convince a jury that the new autopsy would be more accurate than the coroner's Jan. 1 opinion.

Even then, however, the new autopsy would be "subject to challenge by the defendant" given the fact the body would have been dead for more than 10 days, Rosenberg said. Plus, the competing opinions of two coroners would muddy the case, even if the Jefferson Parish investigator admitted that the classification would have changed had all the circumstances been known at the time.

"You certainly have a mountain of doubt, if you're the state, to overcome," Rosenberg said.